Category: Mexican

Plant Based Street Tacos

These plant based street tacos are fast and easy, full of bold flavor! Everyone will love this vegan dinner idea.…

A Couple Cooks – Recipes worth repeating.

These plant based street tacos are fast and easy, full of bold flavor! Everyone will love this vegan dinner idea.

Vegan street tacos

This post was created in partnership with OZO Plant-Based Protein. All opinions are our own.

Here’s a deliciously fresh plant based meal idea…that also takes no time to put together. (Sounds impossible, right?) Try these Plant Based Street Tacos! This vegan taco topping is our new go-to because it’s so easy and delicious, and everyone in our family loves it. The secret? Well, it’s powered by a plant-based protein that blew us away with the flavor and protein level, made by OZO Plant-Based Protein. It’s also a seriously fast dinner you can make in a flash. Ready to get started?

Ingredients in these plant based street tacos

What’s a street taco vs a standard taco? It’s all in the size. A street taco is made to hold in your hand and eat on the go, so it’s smaller than a regular taco. Street tacos are typically made with corn tortillas that are no larger than 5-inches in diameter. If you’re going authentic, you’ll want to double them up to avoid breakage! Here’s what’s in this plant based street taco recipe:

  • 5-inch corn tortillas
  • OZO Plant-Based Mexican Ground (see below)
  • Black bean and corn salad (here)
  • Pickled onions (optional)
  • Cilantro
  • Hot sauce
OZO plant based protein

The key: a great plant based taco meat!

What makes this plant based street taco recipe? The plant based taco protein: OZO Plant-Based Mexican Ground. After taste testing it, we were pleasantly surprised! There are a lot of questionable plant based proteins out there, and this one passed the test at our house. Here’s what we love about it:

  • It’s got 20 grams of protein per serving. A lot of plant based proteins we’ve tried actually don’t have much protein! (Weird, but true.)
  • It’s made of pea protein. Many plant-based proteins are made with gluten or unnatural substances.
  • It’s delicious. The texture is great, and it already tastes like taco meat, so you don’t have to add seasonings.

Optional taco sauces!

These vegan street tacos are seriously simple, so you may want to jazz them up with some additional items if you have extra time. They taste delicious as is, but here are a few different creamy plant-based sauces you might want to try:

  • Chipotle Sauce: This creamy, spicy sauce is made with tahini and adobo sauce (from a can of chipotle chilis). It’s the quickest to make of these options.
  • Cashew Cream: Make it in advance: it’s our go-to creamy vegan sauce that makes anything taste better! You can also try Vegan Sour Cream
  • Cilantro Sauce: This light green sauce is beautifully bright and has a zingy flavor! It’s also cashew based.
Plant based tacos

Tips on warming tortillas

The last tip on making killer plant based street tacos: make sure to warm your tortillas! There’s nothing worse than biting into a cold, leathery tortilla. Corn tortillas especially can break easily when they’re cold. Remember that with street tacos, you’ll want to layer 2 tortillas to avoid breakage. Here’s how to warm tortillas like a pro:

  • Place them over the flame of a gas burner (preferred!). Place each tortilla directly on a gas burner for a few seconds per side, turning with tongs. This lightly chars the edges and warms the tortillas (so they’ll look like the photos). Then throw them into a tortilla warmer!
  • Warm them in the oven. If you don’t have a gas burner, you can warm them in the oven. Go to How to Warm Tortillas.

More taco recipes

Who doesn’t love tacos? Here are a few more tasty taco recipes you might enjoy, many of which are vegan dinner ideas:

This vegan street tacos recipe is…

Vegetarian, vegan, plant-based, dairy-free, and gluten-free.

Print
Vegan street tacos

Plant Based Street Tacos

  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 5 minutes
  • Total Time: 15 minutes
  • Yield: 4 servings (12 tacos)
  • Diet: Vegan
Print Recipe

Description

These vegan street tacos are fast and easy, full of bold flavor! Everyone will love this plant based dinner idea.

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. Make the black bean and corn salad: In a bowl, mix together the beans (drained and rinsed), corn, and pico de gallo with the kosher salt.
  2. Warm the plant based taco meat: In a skillet, warm the OZO Plant-Based Mexican Seasoned Ground, according to the package instructions. 
  3. Warm the tortillas: Warm and char the tortillas by placing them on an open gas flame on medium for a few seconds per side, flipping with tongs, until they are slightly blackened and warm. (See How to Warm Tortillas.)
  4. Assemble the tacos: Layer 2 tortillas, then top with black bean and corn salad, taco meat, onions or pickled onions, cilantro, and hot sauce. 
  • Category: Main dish
  • Method: Stovetop
  • Cuisine: Mexican-inspired

Keywords: Vegan street tacos, plant based tacos, plant based taco meat, OZO plant based protein

A Couple Cooks - Recipes worth repeating.

Chili Lime Salmon with Esquites

This Chili Lime Salmon recipe is topped with creamy esquites (Mexican creamy corn salsa) and can be ready to go in less than 30 minutes! Two of my favorite recipes combine to make this quick and easy 30-minute meal! ♡ First up — chili lime salmon. We make some version of this salmon at least […]

This Chili Lime Salmon recipe is topped with creamy esquites (Mexican creamy corn salsa) and can be ready to go in less than 30 minutes!

Chili Lime Salmon with Esquites

Two of my favorite recipes combine to make this quick and easy 30-minute meal! ♡

First up — chili lime salmon. We make some version of this salmon at least once a month here in our house to serve up in either tacos, fajitas, burrito bowls, taco salad, or on its own with a fun topping or salsa such as this. It’s super easy to cook either on the stovetop or in the oven, seasoned with a simple blend of spices and a squeeze of fresh lime, and always SO delish!

Then to this savory salmon, we add one of the world’s best corn salsas — esquites. Also known as elote en vaso or chascas, this creamy Mexican corn salsa is one of my favorites to make this time of year with fresh corn (or you can just as easily use canned or frozen corn too). The corn is caramelized and lightly charred in a bit of butter and then tossed with a flavorful blend of fresh lime juice, cilantro, cheese, red onion, jalapeño, mayo and a touch of chili powder. And while we most often make this as a dip in our house to serve with tortilla chips, we recently whipped up a quick batch to serve over salmon and rice and it was absolutely fantastic. My husband immediately insisted that we make it again stat, so I have a hunch this recipe is quickly going to become a regular in our house.

Feel free to swap in a different protein (such as chicken, pork, steak, shrimp or another kind of fish) in place of the salmon, if you’d like. And of course, feel free to adjust the ingredient amounts in the esquites to make the corn salsa more or less spicy or creamy to taste.

This recipe is so flavorful and simple — I think you’re going to love it!
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Zucchini Enchilada Casserole

This Zucchini Enchilada Casserole recipe is stacked (instead of rolled) up with layers of sliced zucchini and your favorite enchilada ingredients. Feel free to add meat or make this casserole vegetarian. It’s that time of year when zucchini is about to be overflowing gardens, farmers markets and CSAs everywhere. So I say… …let’s put it […]

This Zucchini Enchilada Casserole recipe is stacked (instead of rolled) up with layers of sliced zucchini and your favorite enchilada ingredients. Feel free to add meat or make this casserole vegetarian.

Zucchini Enchilada Casserole

It’s that time of year when zucchini is about to be overflowing gardens, farmers markets and CSAs everywhere. So I say…

…let’s put it to use in this zucchini enchilada casserole! ♡

This recipe is a riff on my favorite Tex-Mex-inspired chicken enchilada casserole recipe that I’ve made millions of times. But instead of using tortillas to stack those delicious layers upon layers of enchilada fillings, we’ll use long zucchini slices instead, which are quick and easy to make with a basic vegetable peeler or a knife. (Or if you happen to own a mandoline, this would be the perfect recipe to use it too!)

As with any of my enchilada recipes, the filling ingredients in this casserole are completely up to you. You can choose to add chicken, beef, pork, chorizo, or keep the casserole completely vegetarian. If you happen to have some cooked rice, quinoa, farro on hand, I love adding in a few cups to this casserole to make it a bit more hearty and also soak up any of the excess water that is released by the zucchini during cooking. And of course, feel free to chop up whatever leftover veggies happen to be hanging out in your crisper drawer to add those into the filling too! I just highly recommend making one of my homemade enchilada sauces (either red or green) to season this casserole. They are both incredibly delicious and only require a few extra minutes to prep.

The other great thing about this casserole is that it makes a big batch, making this one perfect to serve to a crowd or to create some excellent leftovers for the week ahead. So round up your favorite enchilada ingredients and slice some zucchini, and let’s make this casserole!

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Elote Salad

This delicious elote salad turns Mexican street corn into a salad! It’s creamy, smoky, salty, and absolutely irresistible. Our favorite…

A Couple Cooks – Recipes worth repeating.

This delicious elote salad turns Mexican street corn into a salad! It’s creamy, smoky, salty, and absolutely irresistible.

Elote salad

Our favorite summer side dish over here? Elote, aka Mexican grilled corn. The smoky sweet corn kernels slathered in an irresistibly sauce is the epitome of the season for us. So here’s another fabulous way to eat the same flavors: this Elote Corn Salad! It’s absolutely irresistible, pairing grilled corn with a tangy sauce and bursts of salty cheese. Don’t want to fire up the grill? There’s a shortcut method, too.

What is elote?

Elote, aka Mexican street corn, is grilled corn slathered in a creamy sauce of sour cream, mayonnaise, and chili powder, and sprinkled with cheese. It’s a popular snack served by street vendors in Mexico. Of course, it’s the very best on the street in Mexico or cities that have a strong Mexican heritage to their cuisine: there’s nothing like it!

This elote salad is a spin on the popular side dish that uses all the flavor of elote. But you’ll cut the corn kernels off the cob, making it into a free form corn salad. It’s essentially the same as esquites, a version of elote served in a cup by Mexican street vendors.

Ingredients in elote salad

This elote salad is easy to make: the only part that requires any sort of technique is cooking the corn. See the methods below! Otherwise, all you’ll need is:

  • Corn on the cob (or frozen corn, see below)
  • Green onion
  • Cilantro
  • Mayonnaise
  • Lime juice
  • Cotija cheese, queso fresco, or feta cheese
  • Spices: Chili powder, garlic powder, cumin, and kosher salt
Elote corn salad

Find Cotija cheese or queso fresco (feta is a substitute!)

If you can, look for Cotija cheese for this recipe! It’s the traditional Mexican style of cheese that’s use in elote. Here’s a bit more about it and a few substitutes:

  • Cotija cheese is a Mexican cow’s milk cheese: it’s white with a dry texture and a very salty flavor. You can buy it fresh or aged, but it’s usually easiest to find fresh at the grocery.
  • Queso fresco means fresh cheese in Spanish and is another Mexican cow’s milk cheese. It works as a stand in for Cotija, but it’s much less salty. You may want to add a little salt to recipes if you use this substitute.
  • Feta cheese is a Greek cheese that has a similar crumbly texture to Cotija, and it’s easy to find at the store. It’s similar in saltiness to Cotija as well.

5 ways to cook the corn

This elote salad is delicious no matter how you cook the corn! Mix mayo, lime, and spices into pretty much anything and it will taste delicious (really). Here are our top methods for cooking corn for this recipe:

  • Grilled: Elote salad is at its best with grilled corn! Try this Perfect Grilled Corn.
  • Roasted: Roasted corn is delicious and easy. Try Roasted Corn.
  • Boiled: The standard way to cook corn? Boiled. Try Boiled Corn on the Cob.
  • Sauteed: You can use fresh or frozen corn kernels for this recipe too! Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a skillet, then add the corn kernels and cook 3 to 4 minutes until bright yellow and tender.
  • Smoked: If you have a smoker, this is the way to go! Try Smoked Corn.

That’s it! We hope you love this elote salad recipe. It’s the perfect summer side dish for a grilled dinner! Let us know in the comments below what you think.

Elote salad

More corn salad recipes

There are so many more ways to make a corn salad! Once you’ve tried this elote salad, we recommend the following:

This elote corn salad recipe is…

Vegetarian and gluten-free.

Print

Elote Salad

  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: 15 minutes
  • Total Time: 30 minutes
  • Yield: 4
  • Diet: Vegetarian
Print Recipe

Description

This delicious elote salad turns Mexican street corn into a salad! It’s creamy, smoky, salty, and absolutely irresistible.

Ingredients

  • 6 ears corn (or 5 cups corn kernels*)
  • 1 green onion
  • 3 tablespoons cilantro, finely chopped
  • 3 tablespoons mayonnaise
  • 2 tablespoons lime juice
  • ½ cup crumbled Cotija cheese, queso fresco, or feta cheese
  • ½ teaspoon chili powder
  • ¼ teaspoon each garlic powder, cumin, and kosher salt (or more salt to taste)

Instructions

  1. Cook the corn: Heat a grill to medium high heat (375 to 450 degrees Fahrenheit). Shuck the corn. Use your hands to rub oil on each corn cob evenly. Place the corn directly on the grill grates and cook until it begins to blacken, then turn. Cook about 12 to 15 minutes total, until blackened on all sides. Alternative methods: Make Boiled Corn on the Cob, Roasted Corn on the Cob, or Smoked Corn on the Cob. Or for a quick fix, use 5 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels and sauté for a minute or two in butter in a medium skillet.
  2. Cut the corn off the cob: Find a bundt pan, or large rimmed baking sheet or pan. Place the corn into the hole in the bundt pan or hold the corn vertically inside the baking sheet, then use a chef’s knife to slice down and remove the corn from the cob. The sides of the pan catch the kernels that fly when cutting. See How to Cut Corn off The Cob for more.
  3. Prep the vegetables: Thinly slice the green onion. Finely chop the cilantro.
  4. Make the dressing: In a medium bowl, mix together the sour cream, mayonnaise, lime juice, chili powder, garlic powder, cumin, and kosher salt.
  5. Serve: Mix together the grilled corn, vegetables, and dressing. If desired, top with a sprinkle more cheese crumbles.

Notes

*For a quick fix, you can sauté 5 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a skillet, then add the corn kernels and cook 3 to 4 minutes until bright yellow and tender.

  • Category: Salad
  • Method: Grilled
  • Cuisine: Summer

Keywords: Elote salad, elote corn salad

A Couple Cooks - Recipes worth repeating.

17 of Rick Martinez’s All-Time Best Recipes (Shrimp Tacos, Chicken Sandwiches & Cookies Galore)

Food52’s Resident Sugar Man Rick Martinez builds a fire time and time again with his twice-monthly recipe and video column, Sweet Heat. While Rick always celebrates the vivid colors and big-time flavor found in Mexican cuisine, today, we’re celebrating…

Food52's Resident Sugar Man Rick Martinez builds a fire time and time again with his twice-monthly recipe and video column, Sweet Heat. While Rick always celebrates the vivid colors and big-time flavor found in Mexican cuisine, today, we're celebrating him because it's his birthday. But instead of birthday cake, we've already got ice cream churning away for Rick's Chocolate-Dipped Concha Ice Cream Sandwiches. His homemade rich vanilla bean ice cream is balanced by a spicy berry sauce and warm chile fudge sauce, which slowly melts the ice cream. "It's like eating a really, really delicious messy burger," says Rick. We can't think of a better birthday treat than that.

And for a speedy weeknight dinner to top it all off? Try your hand at his Shrimp Tacos Dorados, al Pastor-Style, which comes together in just 30 minutes. Or, there's this quick Huevos Rancheros With Chorizo & Porky Refried Beans. Both are packed with gentle heat that will light up any night of the week. Ahead, we're sharing 17 recipes that Rick developed exclusively for Food52. For more delicious content, check out his YouTube playlist, where he demos how to make each of these recipes (and gives us a peek into his beautiful Mazatlán home!).

Read More >>

Esquites (Mexican Street Corn Salad)

Are you familiar with esquites? Also known as elote en vaso, esquites are an experience you’ll remember. Esquites are Mexican street corn (elote) cut off the cob,…

The post Esquites (Mexican Street Corn Salad) appeared first on Cookie and Kate.

esquites recipe

Are you familiar with esquites? Also known as elote en vaso, esquites are an experience you’ll remember. Esquites are Mexican street corn (elote) cut off the cob, served in salad form.

Esquites are creamy, tangy, spicy, sweet and savory all at once. In other words, they’re completely irresistible. This elote recipe was the best recipe to come off our grill last summer, and I’m excited to share this stovetop variation with you.

how to make esquites

Esquites share the same ingredients with elote: fresh corn, mayonnaise, cilantro, chili powder, lime and crumbled Cotija cheese. The combination is sublime, and this variation is much easier to eat. I’ve enjoyed both options in Mexico City and love making them at home. I’m going to cook this simple salad all summer and through the rest of the year.

Esquites have one strong cooking advantage over elote—you can start with frozen corn kernels, which really cuts down on preparation time! We’ll just cook the frozen corn in a hot skillet until it’s seared and delicious. If you’re using frozen corn, you can prepare this dish in about twenty minutes, from start to finish.

Continue to the recipe...

The post Esquites (Mexican Street Corn Salad) appeared first on Cookie and Kate.

The Best Queso

I’m super excited to share this queso recipe with you. This Mexican dip is cheesy, creamy and full of fresh flavor. It’s surprisingly easy to make and…

The post The Best Queso appeared first on Cookie and Kate.

best queso recipe

I’m super excited to share this queso recipe with you. This Mexican dip is cheesy, creamy and full of fresh flavor. It’s surprisingly easy to make and utterly irresistible.

This recipe uses a simple secret ingredient—cream cheese—to achieve its gloriously creamy texture and light tang. No flour and no fussy roux required here (as a bonus, this queso is gluten free).

This stovetop queso possesses all of Velveeta’s positive attributes, but it tastes a million times nicer. It even cools down with grace, developing just a slight skin on top that really doesn’t detract from its appeal.

queso ingredients

If you’re like me, you probably don’t need an excuse to eat queso while sipping a margarita. I grew up around a lot of Tex-Mex food and like to consider myself a queso connoisseur. If queso is on the menu, I’ve likely sampled it.

My husband, on the other hand, exercises an impressive amount of restraint when it comes to queso. He tells me he doesn’t like it. (He’s generally a rational man, though I question him in cheese-related matters.) This queso is an exception to his rule. He loves it.

We both agree that this is the best queso we’ve ever had. Try it, and I hope you’ll say the same!

Continue to the recipe...

The post The Best Queso appeared first on Cookie and Kate.

12 Favorite Taco Recipes

What do you say — tacos tonight? I say yes. ♡ And for those of you happen to be looking for some tasty new taco recipes to try, here are a dozen of our readers’ favorite taco recipes that come highly recommended! Whether you’re looking for some new meat, shrimp or fish tacos to try, […]

Shrimp Tacos

What do you say — tacos tonight?

I say yes. ♡ And for those of you happen to be looking for some tasty new taco recipes to try, here are a dozen of our readers’ favorite taco recipes that come highly recommended!

Whether you’re looking for some new meat, shrimp or fish tacos to try, or really want to add some delicious new vegetarian taco recipes to your repertoire…whether you need some 30-minute tacos that you can whip up in a flash, or prefer slow-cooked taco fillings that can simmer all day in the crockpot…whether you feel like starting the day with some breakfast tacos, trying a lightened-up version of crispy fish tacos, or join the internet’s current obsession of dunking quesatacos in broth…there’s hopefully a little something for everyone on this list. So many great taco recipes to try!

Of course, I also have to recommend that you try making a batch of my favorite homemade flour tortillas or corn tortillas to go with them sometime, which are always guaranteed to take taco night to the next level. And if you’re looking to round out your meal, you can never go wrong with some chips and salsa, guacamole, refried beans, this side salad, and some fun drinks (hello margs, mocktails or aguas frescas) on taco night.

Let’s make some tacos!
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Margaritas

All you need are 3 ingredients to make my favorite margarita recipe!  Instructions included for how to make a single serving margarita or pitcher margaritas for a crowd. Raise your hand if you love a good margarita! ♡ This famously sweet, sour and salty drink will forever and always be my all-time favorite cocktail. But […]

All you need are 3 ingredients to make my favorite margarita recipe!  Instructions included for how to make a single serving margarita or pitcher margaritas for a crowd.

Classic Margarita Recipe in Glass with Lime

Raise your hand if you love a good margarita! ♡

This famously sweet, sour and salty drink will forever and always be my all-time favorite cocktail. But while I adore just about any kind of margarita — frozen or on the rocks, tequila or mezcal, fruity or spicy or fizzy or creamy, you name it — a classic margarita cocktail in my book simply cannot be beat.

By contrast to many of the diluted, super-sweet, and sometimes fizzy huge mugs of margaritas that are often served in restaurants around the world nowadays, a traditional margarita is actually a strong, tart cocktail made with three simple ingredients — good-quality tequila, orange liqueur, and freshly-squeezed lime juice. This simple margarita mix is incredibly quick and easy to make, either for a single serving or a larger batch for a crowd. And it is downright delicious served on the rocks, with or without a salted rim.

I have become quite partial over the years to making margaritas with mezcal instead of tequila, which I highly recommend if you love a good smoky cocktail. And if you feel like spicing your drink up a bit, I’ve also included tips below for how to make a spicy salted rim or muddle a few chile peppers into your drink — so good!

Bottom line, if you love margaritas as much as I do, take a moment to read through my tips below and memorize this simple 3:2:1 ingredient ratio. Then let’s make a round of margaritas together. Cheers!

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Chicken Tinga Tacos

These Chicken Tinga Tacos are made with smoky chipotle chicken, served on warm corn tortillas, and loaded up with your favorite fresh toppings. So flavorful and ready to go in just over 30 minutes! Craving chicken tacos but short on time? Make chicken tinga tacos! ♡ Chicken tinga is has long been one of my […]

These Chicken Tinga Tacos are made with smoky chipotle chicken, served on warm corn tortillas, and loaded up with your favorite fresh toppings. So flavorful and ready to go in just over 30 minutes!

Chicken Tinga Tacos Recipe

Craving chicken tacos but short on time?

Make chicken tinga tacos! ♡

Chicken tinga is has long been one of my go-to recipes to make on busy weeknights or to prep ahead of time for easy entertaining. This traditional dish from Puebla, Mexico with its signature smoky, savory, slightly-spicy sauce is remarkably quick and easy to prepare. And when tossed with shredded chicken, loaded into warm corn tortillas, drizzled with a squeeze of fresh lime juice, and sprinkled with your favorite fresh toppings, I’m telling you — these chicken tinga tacos are always a hit.

Feel free to make the chicken tinga however works best for you — either on the stovetop, in the Instant Pot, or in the Crock Pot. And while any tortillas that you happen to have on hand will work here, I can vouch that these tacos are next-level irresistible when made with a batch of these homemade corn tortillas. We just made a batch again the other day and served them with chips and salsa, a simple Mexican-inspired side salad, and margaritas and it was one of the best meals I’ve had all month. Always so good!

So if you’re looking for a new taco recipe to add to your repertoire that’s big on flavor and low on prep time, round up these simple ingredients and let’s make some chicken tinga tacos!

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